News Releases

Northeast Ohio Hosts Visit by Federal Preparedness Official

In late January, Northeast Ohio hosted a visit from Dr. Nicole Lurie, Assistant Secretary for Preparedness and Response (ASPR) for the U. S. Department of Health and Human Services. As the principal advisor on matters related to bioterrorism and other public health emergencies, Dr. Lurie was invited to Cleveland by The Center for Health Affairs and Rainbow Babies & Children's Hospital to hear how Ohio and the region are preparing for mass casualty disasters specifically affecting pediatric populations as well as to gain insight from her national perspective. 

Dr. Lurie began her day by talking with an intimate group of about 60 attendees at Rainbow Babies & Children’s Hospital, where panelists from the Ohio Department of Health, Ohio Hospital Association, and Ohio Emergency Medical Services along with the American Association of Pediatrics and physicians from Rainbow discussed their organizations’ roles, the development of a new pediatric triage system, and the allocation of scarce resources.

Later, a crowd of about 100 attended Dr. Lurie’s presentation at the City Club, Building National Preparedness: Lessons Learned from Recent Events. There, she extolled the fact that volunteerism, especially from the medical community, will in effect lead to increased resiliency for a community in the face of an extraordinary event.

During her visit, Dr. Lurie also provided insight regarding upcoming changes to the federal preparedness initiative, with hospital preparedness and public health programs being aligned in a new four- to five-year grant with interwoven capabilities, one of which will volunteer management. She also discussed the formation of healthcare coalitions as a strategy for increasing the community’s ability to respond to incidents in a planned and practiced approach, as well as the importance of having a database of trained and credentialed volunteers to call upon and mobilize in a disaster.

For more information on the regional preparedness initiative, contact Beth Gatlin at beth.gatlin@chanet.org or 216.255.3665.